


Leaving the Now

by Zaganthi (Caffiends)



Category: Elfquest
Genre: F/M, Quiet Night In
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-19
Updated: 2015-12-19
Packaged: 2018-05-07 16:30:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5463410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caffiends/pseuds/Zaganthi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her eyes had met his eyes over, over and over, and love mates had grown deeper almost from the start, childish games and dalliances with others quickly falling off for a deeper relationship, but recognition didn't come.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Leaving the Now

**Author's Note:**

  * For [plumeria47](https://archiveofourown.org/users/plumeria47/gifts).



No one could choose Recognition. It was a fact, a driving force in their community, and when they'd met the others, it was still a driving force. Recognition, that moment when eyes met eyes and soul met soul…

Nightfall let her hand idle down to touch sleek red braids, half tempted in the dying lamplight to pluck at loose strands and undo them entirely. It had been too long since he'd let his hair go completely wild, and half the time he even slept with his circlet still in place. She let her fingers move there, then, brushed against his temple and then crept under Redlance's circlet to brush it loose of his hair, to rub fingers against sensitive skin while he slept. Frequently, they'd had Cutter's company, but some nights he kept his own counsel despite their deepest worries. His mind had drifted entirely free of the Now, and he'd changed, no longer touched by joy and wonder, but planning, plotting and providing in a way that his father would've been surprised by. She'd once thought they'd never have a chief who was prouder or stronger than Bearclaw, who led a fierce war against the humans, to his tribes' pain. It had been... It had felt right at the time, the only choice to make, and she was a warrior. But Cutter, young as he was when Bearclaw had died, was an unexpected thinker, sharing what felt like a brain with Skywise.

Redlance was a worrier, by nature, in a way that she knew would serve them all when their child was born. She would help keep them fed, and safe from humans, and he would worry well and protect body and heart. He was good at it. Though the humans grew more and more crafty, Redlance's abilities grew, too, turning patches of green into traps and carefully woven hides to conceal them from prying eyes.   Her eyes had met his eyes over, over and over, and love mates had grown deeper almost from the start, childish games and dalliances with others quickly falling off for a deeper relationship, but recognition didn't come. They'd shared everything, except that mad compulsion to mate. The whole world fell into Recognition with their preferred mates, and it didn't come for her and Redlance, leaving them as odd fringes of the tribe. She was told that it wasn't meant to be, that they were love mates and nothing more, that someone out there who was really meant for her would find her, but in those days other tribes were a whisper, a half-memory, and no one had expected to find them. Their tribe was small and they were lucky the bloodlines didn't cross.Sometimes, she wondered if that was why she and Redlance hadn't Recognised, that they were too close in blood, or that perhaps he wasn't right for her.  Or she wasn't right for him, which was more likely. He was a soft, gentle soul, strong like the Father tree and their Holt, and she was a fighter, more attuned to the hunt, the howl, the now. She didn't build or create like he did, and it had worried at her and worried at her that he had settled because there was no one else who was dependable and that she was enough. Not everything, but enough. She'd worried that he'd change his choice, even through their tribe was small. 

He grumbled against her shoulder and mashed his face against her chest for a moment as he re-settled in his sleep, close and warm like a bonfire in their furpile. Now, she had created. Not on her own or not on his own, not even together by themselves, but through the blessing of the highones and the gentle work of Leetah, knitting things in the healing spaces so that their cub would be well, and born as strong as any other cub from Recognition. The go-backs had no challenges, and cubs aplenty, but it wasn't how Nightfall had been brought up, wasn't what she knew. 

Since Cutter had led them so far, so differently than his father ever had, things had been changing, but once, once she'd laid abed with Nightfall and worried that she wasn't enough, and wouldn't ever be enough, that they'd never have a Cub because… because. And when they'd started to meet other elves, and Cutter had recognized Leetah, an elf from so distant that he never would have Recognized her if not for the trolls meddling, she'd started to wonder if her beloved was one day going to turn to some foreign elven maiden and Recognise. Despite their sharing of names, despite everything they'd chosen for themselves…

She didn't worry about that now, though their world had turned upside down with the theft of the palace. Even exchanging their names, to tighten the binds of their love had been… it had been Redlance choosing her, selecting and affirming what they knew, that they each knew enough other enough to turn love mates to life mates against the world's choosing for them.    

((Busy head.)) Umm tipped his head up, sitting up enough to lean on one elbow, looking at her. She let her hand fall to the side. ((Can't Sleep?)) 

((Remembering.)) Rather than living in the now, quick snapshots of memory that she shared with him, of their time in the Holt, of before the world had expanded past good hunts and howls and existing. Before everything had become strange and treacherous, and the expanded love of families meeting and mingling turned sour with ill intent. (( blame the high ones for remembering.)) 

((I thank the high ones for remembering.)) He curled his fingers over the curve of her belly, smiling at her with a sly gleam in his eyes. ((And for helping us.)) 

She pushed a feeling of warmth at him, and slid down in the furs, leaning in for a kiss. ((I think we would have gotten there on our own, in time. But sooner is… better. She's ready for the world soon.)) 

She didn't know what kind of world she would be coming into, but Redlance would help her, ready her for whatever they faced. They had the whole tribe, more love and family than they'd ever had before, a knitting of three tribes that brought new traditions, new crafts and stories to be shared around the fires. ((She is. I wonder what adventures she'll see in her lifetime.))

  


End file.
